n it in
the way you are doing."

"Why, Annie, what ails you?" cried Rose in her bewilderment at Annie's
unreasonableness and excitement, forgetting any verdict that might be
passed on her own neglect of the code of conduct imposed upon her.

"Well, if you only knew how I have been tried--and molested--and laughed
at," Annie began wrathfully, saying the last words as if to be laughed
at was equivalent to being burnt alive. Then she stopped short and
turned again upon Rose. "What have you been doing? tell me this instant,
Rose."

"I don't think you ought to speak to me in this manner," said Rose,
rebelliously, holding her head high in the air, and forgetting in her
soreness of spirit either to crumple her nose or wrinkle her forehead;
"and I am not at all ashamed of myself. I have done nothing wrong;
indeed, I believe I have conferred a real benefit on Mrs. Jennings,
though she is apt to put it the other way, and indirectly on Hester. I
_am_ fond of Mrs. Jennings and Hester--_they_ always treat me, even
Hester does, like a rational creature. Oh! you need not fret and
fume--I am not trying to avoid telling you, though you have no right, no
sister has, to demand an account of my proceedings. Father and mother
may have, but they would never brandish their rights in my face or
refuse to trust me. I was coming home from Covent Garden on Saturday
afternoon, carrying a little pot of tulips for my picture, if you must
know, and I had also got a small parcel from 'Burnet's.' I was caught in
the thunder-storm. I was standing in a doorway not knowing what to do
when a gentleman passed--Dr. Harry Ironside, if I am to be allowed to
say his name, though I did not know it then. He was good-natured and
polite, like any other gentleman. He saw how I was encumbered, and he
must have felt the pelting rain. He stopped and asked if he could do
anything for me--call a cab or anything, and he wished to give me the
use of his umbrella till we reached a cab-stand or till an omnibus came
up. I thought I had better tell him why I was carrying things, for he
might have thought me just a shop-girl, so I merely said I required them
for a painting, and that I was learning to be an artist. He seemed to
think he ought to tell me in return what he was, and he said he was a
doctor. Then I said father was a doctor too, Dr. Millar of Redcross. He
cried out at that something about a likeness which he had seen, and he
asked had I a sister a nurse in St. Ebb